Alexander: Coalition must prevent permanent isolation from Europe

Liberal Democrat chief secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander bids to paper over coalition divides on Europe after Nick Clegg criticised David Cameron's use of the veto in last week's summit:

"It is so important that we look at how we act as a government now, so that this setback does not become permanent isolation.

"But in a sense we use the various other areas where we are very positively engaged as a government, where we've been leading, to take those forward, to make sure that we don't end up in the kind of permanent isolation which I think would be terrible for this country, but which does sadly seem to be what some of the more extreme eurosceptics would like to see."